Author: Neftaly Malatjie

A lifestyle is an individual’s pattern of living expressed through activities, interests, and opinions.

1. Lifestyle patterns include the way people spend time, extent of interaction with others, and general outlook on life and living.
2. People partially determine their own lifestyle, but lifestyles are influenced by other factors such as personality and demographics.
3. Lifestyles strongly impact the consumer buying decision process, including product needs.
4. The VALS program
5. a)     Developed by SRI Consulting Business Intelligence
6. b)     One of the most popular frameworks for exploring consumer lifestyles. It divides consumers into eight groups: innovators, thinkers, achievers, experiencers, believers, strivers, makers and survivors.

.     Personality is a set of internal traits and distinct behavioral tendencies which result in consistent patterns of behavior.

1. a)     Personality arises from unique hereditary characteristics and personal experiences.
2. b)     Studies of the link between buying behavior and personality have been inconclusive; although many marketers are convinced there is a link.
3. c)     The VALS program is a consumer framework based on individual personality characteristics.
4. d)     Advertisements may be aimed at certain personality types, usually focusing on positively valued personality characteristics.
5. Self-concept, or self-image,is a perception or view of oneself.
6. a)     Buyers purchase products that reflect and enhance self-concept.
7. b)     A person’s self-concept may influence whether he or she buys a product in a specific product category and may have an impact on brand selection.
8. Lifestyles

An attitude is an individual’s enduring evaluation of, feelings about, and behavioral tendencies toward a tangible or intangible object or idea.

1. Attitudes remain generally stable in the short term, but they can change over time.
2. An attitude consists of three major components:
3. a)     cognitive (knowledge and information about an object or idea)
4. b)     affective (feelings and emotions toward an object or idea)
5. c)     behavioral (actions regarding an object or idea)
6. Consumers’ attitudes toward a firm and its products strongly influence the success or failure of the organization’s marketing strategy.
7. Marketers should measure consumer attitudes toward prices, package designs, brand names, advertisements, salespeople, repair services, store locations, features of existing or proposed products, and social responsibility activities.
8. Seeking to understand attitudes has resulted in two major academic models
9. a)     The Fishbein Model (the attitude toward the object) can be used to understand a consumer’s attitude, including beliefs about product attributes, strength of beliefs and evaluation of beliefs. These elements combine to form the overall attitude toward the object.
10. b)     The Theory of Reasoned Action (behavior intentions model) focuses on intentions to act or purchase. It considers consumer perceptions of what other people believe is the best choice among a set of alternatives and focuses on attitudes toward buying behavior.
11. Several methods help marketers gauge consumer attitude.
12. a)     Direct questioning of consumers.

(1)    The Internet and social networking sites have become valuable tools.

1. b)     An attitude scale is a means of measuring consumers’ attitudes by gauging the intensity of individuals’ reactions to adjectives, phrases, or sentences about an object.
2. Marketers may try to change negative attitudes toward an aspect of a marketing mix to make them more favorable, but this is generally a long, expensive, and difficult task and may require extensive promotional efforts.